Tag: travel

My brain hurts from all the stuff I learned today. Training proceeds at lightspeed. I think I’m retaining most of it. I’m feeling pretty close to being ready to hit the ground running next Monday in the new position back in NWA. It’ll be a while before I get my workflow really efficient, but that’s a fun challenge in and of itself, right?

Finally got to IKEA today. I love it nearly as much as I thought I would. I’ve never been to one. I hope to go to one again soon. I ate the swedish meatballs. Excellent. So was the macaroni and cheese.

Bought a few things, including a tinkertoy-like building set for The Boy’s birthday next week.

Finally got to the Mall of America, too. I needed to go by the Apple Store to have my iPhone checked out. It was showing some display flakiness. They replaced it quickly, and I’ve already restored all my info on it. LOVE the iPhone.

Also got to briefly fondle a MacBook Air. Astonishing construction. WAY more solid than my MacBook. Still underpowered and overpriced for my wants (needs?), though.

MOA also has a Legoland. They were near to closing, so I just got to browse. The Boy and I will be having SO much fun with Lego soon.

Looking forward to going to Germany. Just 15 days away!

Tired now. Must sleep before tomorrow, another full day of training and meeting people.

Day 1 of training with the new company went pretty smoothly. The people are really great. They (we? I won’t be working out of this office, though) have a Wii and foosball table in the break room. Free (pretty good) coffee. I think I’m going to like working here.

Was going to go to IKEA and/or the Mall of America after work, but decided I was too tired. Will definitely do it either tomorrow night or Wednesday night after work. There’s snow on the ground here. Apparently, it stays around all winter. That would take some getting used to. It was a balmy 35F or so today, though.

Yup. I’m here in Minneapolis. Home of two of my most favorite 80s musical acts: Prince, the Replacements, and Hüsker Dü. Okay, that was three. So far, I’ll have to say that the people are friendly and it’s very cold. And their pizza is good even if they employ the wrong cut (the grid or tavern cut).

I’m here for a week of meeting the new boss and other folks, doing some training, and getting orientated to the culture of my new employers.

Yes, new employers. I have given up the full-time freelance action for a return to the online news business with an interesting job with a really (so far) cool company. I’m not going to say who they are, because this blog isn’t about them; it’s about me.

Anyway, more about Minneapolis — including a trip to the Mall of America and IKEA (SQUEEEEEE!) — and travel throughout the week. Maybe some about work, too.

I got my GenCon 2006 badge in the mail today! W00t! My trip to GenCon got thwarted by house repairs last year, but this year nothing’s going to stop me. We (my friend Tim and I) also bought our plane tickets last night, too, so I REALLY can’t NOT go this year.

If you look closely, you can see my two favorite event tickets, too: (1) Luke Crane’s “Fires Over Omac” Burning Empires session and (2) Luke Crane’s “Inheritance” Burning Wheel session. Tim and I both are playing in both sessions, and we’re really looking forward to the Luke Crane Experience ™.

P.S. GenCon people: your website SUUUCCKKKSSSSS!! Seriously. Hire some serious usability experts next year to redesign the information in your site, not just tart it up.